


and then, and again

by shcherbatskayas



Category: Super Dangan Ronpa 2
Genre: F/M, Kuzuryu Fuyuhiko Swears, Painter and muse nonsense, Reincarnation AU, Renaissance nonsense, shcherbatskayas content, thank you anh for my life
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-26
Updated: 2018-05-26
Packaged: 2019-05-13 21:18:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,328
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14756489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shcherbatskayas/pseuds/shcherbatskayas
Summary: The same situation, twice.





	and then, and again

**Author's Note:**

  * For [thewildwilds](https://archiveofourown.org/users/thewildwilds/gifts).



> so @thewildwilds and i were talking about an au where fuyuhiko was a renaissance painter and peko was his muse and then it turned into a reincarnation au where fuyuhiko is an art student and peko works at the museum and they bond over Old Fuyuhiko's stuff and now this exists. i wrote this as fast as humanly possible because i just. i love this au lads. i'm shookth by it. anyways, heres my speedwrite, and i hope you like it <3333

**August 3rd, 1502**

Fuyuhiko is bored. It’s a deep down in his bones sort of feeling that was with him when he woke up and hasn’t faded since. He’s wandered around the estate for hours, looking for something to draw, but nothing strikes him. How many times has he sketched the staircases or painted the gardens of his own home? It must be in the thousands, the hundreds of thousands. Or maybe not. Fuyuhiko is young and self-taught (that is, until he can find one of the old masters to take him on), and so he hasn’t got as much done as some of the proper apprentices his age. But still, he’s young. He has time. 

And he’s bored. 

The estate is sprawling, occupying a huge section of the city, and so in theory, he has a lot to draw. Fuyuhiko looks out the window and sees the familiar bridges, the sludge of blue water that flows beneath them, feels the oppressive heat that pushes down on him and makes the boredom even more pronounced. Nothing is interesting, nothing is new, Fuyuhiko wants to see other cities and what could be there, but funds are short and his father is already pissed enough at him for being so invested in art. He’s very well not going to take some of his noble’s fortune and send it so that he can go adventuring. When the old geezer dies, Fuyuhiko can do whatever he wants with that money, but until then, it’s a waiting game. So is finding something interesting to do. It’s just a waiting game. 

And then. 

Fuyuhiko’s at the bottom of the stairs, and he sees a flicker of movement at the top of it. A serving girl going somewhere. He’s seen her a thousand times but never really looked at her. Not until now. Her hair is tied back and she’s all business, not looking at anything but the task in front of her, which is apparently sweeping the floor. She wields that broom like he’s seen knights do in paintings, with the confidence and certainty that her cause is just and noble, even if it is a little simple. Her expression is intense and she’s got this silvery hair that looks white in the light, like all the heat of the sun compressed itself on her scalp and spilled outwards. The boredom fades because Fuyuhiko can’t remember the last time he’s seen a look like that in real life, a look like that for something as mundane as cleaning the floor. What would she look like if she actually was out there protecting the kingdom or descending from the heavens to deliver justice or just looking out the window and thinking about something other than the dirt on the top of the stairs? Fuyuhiko wants to know, and the only way to know is to draw it. But first, he has to draw her like this, just so that he can remember her face. That’s all. It’s just so he can remember her face. 

He’s only got so much time before she moves on and keeps cleaning that floor. He’s only got so long with her in sight. He has some parchment and a pencil and his hands move frantic fast, an urgency rising in his chest. He’s on the verge of some sort of breakthrough, he knows it. This moment is his, and he can’t lose it. He won’t lose it. Fuyuhiko gets the rough lines down, but now he needs the details. He only has seconds to get them, less than seconds, so he has to make his gaze count. He has to get everything. He looks at her, and he looks at her, and he looks at her.

She looks back. 

***

**February 24th, 2018**

It’s dark and cold outside, but the museum is warm and it’s familiar territory for him. It’s like walking in the front door. Fuyuhiko’s been here all month, looking at the paintings of the old guys, the ones who had this whole art thing down pat. He’s self-taught; that is, until he finishes his portfolio and sends it off to every art school in a fifty mile radius. Then he’s good. And sure, his family mostly hates that he’s going to art school, but his family can mostly fuck off as far as he’s concerned. He’s going to draw. He’s not going to stop drawing. The question is, _what is he going to draw?_

What to draw, what to draw, what to draw. His anatomy is shit and he knows it, and so he copies some of the older paintings to get it down in his sketchbook before he does portraits of his own, sometimes flipping back to check to see if he’s gotten the proportions right. As he expected, Fuyuhiko’s getting better. Not as good as he wants to be, but better. But now there’s the question of which one to do today because the museum is huge and the options are a little suffocating sometimes. But only sometimes. 

He ends up in the exhibit of the artist that shares his name, and no, Fuyuhiko doesn’t like him just because they share a name. That’s just a bonus. The real reason is that something in his brush strokes and lines is fun to look at, and he has the easiest time understanding his art, understanding everything that went into it and every emotion behind it. Every time he sketches one of his works, it feels familiar and natural. Like he’s done it before. Almost like muscle memory. 

The silver-haired girl (Is that her natural color? Can't be. It's gotta be dye.) is working the front desk again, and he pays for his ticket silently and without looking at her. He’s never really looked at her, or even looked at her name tag. She’s just been part of the background, not something to draw. He gets a ticket and he doesn’t think anything of it. 

Once he’s in the exhibit, he sits down on one of the benches and looks around for a long time. The paintings are old friends at this point, and again he finds himself thinking about the Old Fuyuhiko and his muse, some white-haired girl who might have been a servant if what the historians have pieced together is right. The plaques speculate that they were lovers from the letter fragments and sketchbooks they’ve found, and every time, Fuyuhiko wonders what it must be like to feel something like that, a passion and curiosity so deep and centered so specifically on one person. He can feel it rising in his chest when he reads about it, but it never comes all the way through. He doesn’t have a muse like that. He might never have a muse like that. 

And then. 

Silver-haired girl leads a tour through the exhibit. Her voice is low, her tone is knowledgeable, she moves like she’s done this a thousand times and yet isn’t sick of it because she knows her cause is just and noble, if not a little simple for her at this point. The winter sun comes through one of the windows and lights her hair up white, like it’s stolen all of the heat from the sun and spread out over her whole scalp and every bit of hair on it. Fuyuhiko can't believe that he somehow ignored her presence because now it's silently electric, setting every nerve in his body on edge and at attention. Maybe he just needed to see her like this. Maybe that's it. The way she moves has him itching for his pencil and Fuyuhiko gets the rough lines down as quickly as he can, but he still needs the details. He has some time to get them, but not enough time. Never enough time. He has seconds. Maybe less than seconds. 

So he looks at her, and he looks at her, and he looks at her. 

She looks back.


End file.
